LG has developed a new lamp that doubles as an indoor garden. The lamp, which LG will show off at CES in January, serves as an adjustable grow light for the tray of up to 20 plants beneath it, while also brightening up your room. It has two different lighting modes: downward-facing lighting during the day that helps grow your …
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Samsung will let you disable annoyingly-bright HDR content across all apps
Loading up HDR photos and videos can be a great way of showcasing the fancy display on your new phone and testing just how bright it can get. But sometimes, especially at night, you might not want your screen to crank into overdrive with blinding highlights just because someone posted a random video to Instagram in HDR. (Devices are increasingly …
Read More »Eddy Cue explains why Apple won’t make a search engine
If this Court prohibits Google from sharing revenue for search distribution, Apple would have two unacceptable choices. It could still let users in the United States choose Google as a search engine for Safari, but Apple could not receive any share of the resulting revenue, so Google would obtain valuable access to Apple’s users at no cost. Or Apple could …
Read More »The 2TB WD_Black C50 Xbox expansion card hits record low $190
If you’ve just unwrapped a new Xbox Series X or Series S for Christmas, you’ll have enough storage out of the box to download several games. But you’ll quickly feel the squeeze from 100GB-plus installs, especially if you tend to keep a heavy rotation. Expansion cards are your only relief on Xbox consoles if you’re playing titles optimized for Series …
Read More »Netflix in 2024: the best shows and movies
2024 will go down as the year Netflix made its huge push into sports. It was the exclusive home for the “disgusting-but-can’t-look-away” hot dog eating contest between Joey Chestnut and his rival, Takeru Kobayashi. The streamer also broadcast the Mike Tyson vs. Jake Paul boxing match that would have been abysmally boring if not for the bloody women’s match right …
Read More »Even Apple wasn’t able to make VR headsets mainstream in 2024
Apple’s Vision Pro headset is an incredible piece of technology, but even Apple’s design and marketing magic hasn’t been enough to convince many people to don a VR headset for an entire day. Instead, people seem more willing to use discreet wearables like Bluetooth headphones, smartwatches, and products like the Ray-Ban Meta glasses — so Apple’s headset isn’t making the …
Read More »Bose SoundLink Home review: a speaker that’s all about looks
Sometimes it’s okay to buy a speaker mostly for the aesthetic. And from the moment it was first announced, Bose’s $219 SoundLink Home stood out from the pack (and Bose’s own other efforts) with a mid-modern style that bears little resemblance to most competitors. It’s the kind of gadget that people are likely to notice and comment on. No one …
Read More »Squid Game season 2 review: a brutal remix of Netflix’s biggest show
In the three years since Squid Game became Netflix’s biggest property, it’s been easy to forget just why it was so popular to begin with. The unflinching story of class conflict that combined iconic visuals, schoolyard games, and a nihilistic view of humanity, has largely been buried beneath ill-conceived reality shows, influencer knockoffs, cartoon-ish mobile games, and all manner of …
Read More »What podcasts looked like in 2024 — literally
In 2024, podcasts have gotten closer to becoming a video-first medium. Though video podcasts have been around a relatively long time, shows from The New York Times, NPR, and many other podcast networks that have been audio-only for years have recently started adding a video component in order to gain new listenership. In fact, Spotify, a major player in podcasts, …
Read More »2024 has been an amazing year for roguelikes
The roguelike genre has turned from a relative niche into something much bigger. Roguelike games can be famously tough to crack into; generally, they have a high difficulty that means you’ll bang your head against a wall as you learn how to play the game, puzzle out what strategies work best in the procedurally generated levels, and figure out how …
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